Chapter 71: Family Secret Techniques 

Atop the immense earthen wall, three children lay on their stomachs and peered over the edge. 

"That's Uchiha Itachi," Shikun whispered. 

Hana narrowed her eyes. "So the rumor was true. Bandage-face really did beat him." 

They had invented the nickname as a small act of retaliation against Tonbo's punishment. 

Saiji shivered. "Why do I feel as though he's watching us?" 

"He covers his eyes," Hana said. "He must be a sensor. Get back to practice before he decides we're slacking." 

Three heads vanished from the edge. 

Below, Tonbo set Sasuke on his feet. "Are you certain you don't want to spar, Itachi? You could show your little brother how strong you have become." 

Itachi's chakra had increased markedly since their last meeting. His mental energy was developing even faster, constrained more by his young body than by any lack of aptitude. Missions had sharpened him as well. Even so, he glanced toward the children hiding above and shook his head. 

"We should leave. Thank you for the figures." 

He took Sasuke's hand and departed before Tonbo could propose another test. Sasuke carried his collection against his chest and waved politely with his free hand. 

Tonbo watched the brothers go. If Itachi ever faced a choice too heavy to bear alone, would he seek Tonbo's advice? Probably not. To the boy, Tonbo was merely an unusually capable jōnin who sometimes offered guidance and far too often used him for experiments. 

Speculating about distant disasters would not improve the present. Tonbo returned his attention to the plateau. Hana was close to mastering the exercise; the boys still struggled to maintain even the most basic balance. 

By sunset, the three children descended only because Tonbo lowered the wall. Hana returned to the Inuzuka compound with one of the Haimaru Brothers draped over her shoulder, his tongue hanging out from exhaustion. 

Kiba was tossing a toy for Akamaru when someone knocked. He hurried to the door and found his sister leaning against the frame. 

"Water," Hana said. "Please." 

Kiba fetched a cup and watched her drain it. "What happened to you?" 

"I met a dreadful uncle who worked me nearly to death." 

"Did he bully you? When Mother gets home, tell her. She'll beat him up." 

"No!" 

Hana answered so quickly that Kiba flinched. 

"Then why are you exhausted?" he asked. 

Hana considered several lies and rejected each one. Kiba would repeat anything interesting to their mother, and Tsume could pry the truth from either sibling in minutes. "Training ran late. That's all." 

"With the bad uncle?" 

"I never called him bad." 

Kiba stared at her. The ninken covered his muzzle with one paw. Hana shoved the empty cup back into her brother's hands and announced that she needed dinner before he could ask anything else. 

She had expected her punishment to end that evening. Instead, Tonbo had ordered all three children to report to Training Ground 98 after the Academy each day. If she told her family the truth, they would punish her for attacking a jōnin and then enthusiastically approve his training. Silence was her only defense. 

The weary ninken barked. Tonbo had eventually decided that Hana's partner needed conditioning too. 

At the Izuno home, Saiji's parents reacted very differently. A jōnin had volunteered to guide their son before he had even graduated. Their family could count such opportunities across generations. 

Saiji saw their pride and forced himself to sit straighter despite his aching muscles. "Tonbo-uncle said that, if the family allows it, I can show him our secret techniques. He thinks he may be able to plan better training for me." 

His parents' smiles faltered. 

Secret techniques were a clan's inheritance and protection. Even assigned team leaders did not automatically earn the right to study them. Offering that knowledge to an outsider could strengthen Saiji—or expose everything their family had preserved. 

"The elders must decide," his father said at last. 

The Fūma clan faced the same question and reached an answer much faster. Its leaders possessed better intelligence about Tonbo. They knew he commanded the Analysis Team, a position no member of their own family had ever attained, and they understood the value of his attention. 

They authorized Shikun to show him the relevant techniques. 

Reviving the Fūma name demanded risks. The clan had already sent its most gifted member, Arashi, to study secretly under Orochimaru. Receiving independent guidance for Shikun created another path forward, one they refused to waste. 

Shikun listened from outside the meeting room and felt pride mingle with fear. His elders spoke of him as an investment in the clan's future, not merely a child learning after school. The scroll they entrusted to him seemed heavier than its paper and ink could explain. He promised to guard it, follow Tonbo's instructions, and report everything he learned. 

When he met Saiji the following morning, neither boy admitted how serious the discussion at home had become. They argued about who would reach the top of the practice pillar first. Hana declared that both of them would lose to her. Their ordinary rivalry made the burden easier to carry. 

Five months passed without a major crisis. 

Tonbo's days settled into a demanding rhythm. The Analysis Team grew more efficient under his direction, and the barrier unit advanced steadily. Their large-scale Sealed Horizon design approached completion as repeated trials exposed weaknesses and allowed the four specialists to refine its layers. 

His three young attackers appeared after class as ordered. Other Academy students occasionally came to challenge him after hearing exaggerated versions of Hana's success, but Tonbo dismissed them after one painful lesson. He had neither the time nor the desire to adopt every reckless child in Konoha. 

Iruka visited once during those months and discovered exactly what his careless complaints had inspired. Tonbo placed him beside the children and ran all four through the same control drills. Hana delighted in competing with her teacher, while the boys treated every stumble from Iruka as proof that adults could fail too. Iruka endured the session without revealing that Tonbo had already trained him far beyond these basics. 

Afterward, he apologized for letting Tonbo's name become a classroom target. Tonbo accepted, then reminded him that an instructor who complained about his own teacher should expect students to become curious. Iruka left with sore legs and a renewed determination to choose his examples more carefully. 

Hana, Shikun, and Saiji were different. Their original ambush had shown judgment and cooperation, and their families accepted the arrangement. Tonbo focused on chakra control, shape manipulation, the Three Basic Techniques, and exercises tailored to their clan arts. Their age and reserves made powerful ninjutsu unnecessary and potentially harmful. 

Hana progressed reliably. Shikun and Saiji needed an entire month to complete tree climbing and water walking. Even compared with Iruka and Mibu Shinobu at similar stages, their pace was slow. 

Tonbo never told them that. Small clans already burdened their children with enough doubt. 

Their inherited arts rewarded his patience. The Fūma had studied chakra shaping deeply enough to create functional wings, granting brief aerial movement. The technique demanded control approaching jōnin level, which explained why few family members could use it safely. Tonbo began designing incremental exercises so Shikun could build toward it over years instead of failing against the completed form. 

The Izuno techniques followed an entirely different principle. Cat Cloak shaped chakra into ears, claws, and a tail, lending the user feline balance and striking power. Their greater art, Cat Spirit Possession, surrounded the caster with a towering chakra avatar capable of attacking independently. 

Saiji could not yet sustain even one complete claw, but fragments of the shape revealed the technique's demands. It required simultaneous transformation at several points around the body, each responding to movement without collapsing the others. Tonbo reduced the problem to a sequence: one claw, two, then the balance of a tail before any attempt at the full cloak. Saiji complained about the simplicity until the first stable claw cut a groove into the practice post. After that, he followed the plan without argument. 

Both traditions possessed genuine potential. Their weakness lay not in conception but in the missing bridge between elementary training and the finished secret art. 

As the children repeated their exercises, Tonbo adjusted three separate plans. Hana needed challenges. Shikun needed a path toward precise wing structures. Saiji needed stable layers before attempting an avatar. 

Talent mattered, but instruction could decide whether talent ever had the chance to matter.